


The Keeper

by AcrackinReality



Series: Blurry and Cryptic [4]
Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Canonical Character Death, Guardians - Freeform, Impa and Purah mentioned, It Gets Better, Link and Zelda aren't friends, Mipha - Freeform, Revali - Freeform, Selectively Mute Link (Legend of Zelda), Shrine of Resurrection, The Great Calamity (Legend of Zelda), Trapped, Wolfie gets MAD, Wolfie is not Twilight, Wolfie meets Link, as well as the rating, at first, but the tag is there anyway, daruk - Freeform, it's vague, need we say more?, no need for explanation, not really descriptive, palmorae ruins, there is a bit of gore, they appear for a bit, until it goes very wrong, urbosa - Freeform, we're getting backstory!, yeah?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-14
Updated: 2021-01-14
Packaged: 2021-03-12 10:00:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28758477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AcrackinReality/pseuds/AcrackinReality
Summary: He was trapped.He was trapped with no way out after abandoning his home and all the people there.But did he feel remorse?Did he regret? Did he wallow in sorrow? Did he wish for a way to return? To go back to the days of blissful, ignorant youth?Absolutely not.~ Wolfie meets Link
Series: Blurry and Cryptic [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2002768
Comments: 9
Kudos: 99





	The Keeper

**Author's Note:**

> Wolfie backstory! We repeat! Wolfie backstory! 
> 
> **Well** , not quite, but the more recent stuff at least!
> 
> Don’t worry. Impa’s coming; already got her scene written out. We just need to _get there_. 
> 
> Anyway, there’s a question in the end notes that we’d appreciate you consider? After you’re done reading, of course.

He was trapped. 

He was trapped with no way out after abandoning his home and all the people there.

But did he feel remorse?

Did he regret? Did he wallow in sorrow? Did he wish for a way to return? To go back to the days of blissful, ignorant youth?

Absolutely not.

The Goddess abandoned them, so he abandoned the Goddess.

If that were the reason he was trapped here, then he doesn’t really care. Rather, this is the best thing to happen to him yet.

He was housed in a circular cage, a mirror if you will, overlooking a quiet beach. There were huge rocks, an abundance of tall skinny trees, palm trees, the locals had called them, and a few strange pedestals that glowed a faint orange. 

Locals would hang out by his cage. They would lean against it, share secrets behind it, or pass notes and gifts in its shadow. He had tried talking to the locals that would pass by, but they never answered. They wouldn’t so much as glance his way, in fact. It was as if no one could see or hear him. 

That was okay. He could just watch. And listen. 

He liked the young woman who would sit in the shade he provided and read. He liked the small boy who went crab-hunting and reluctantly released his catch by the stone at his mother’s orders. He liked the man who leaned his small boat against his cage and sat with his wife for lunch.

His favorite, though, was an old woman who led her blind granddaughter over to trace the carvings so she had something to look at. And when her granddaughter wasn’t there, she cleaned his cage and thanked him for being there and talked to him as if she knew he was real. (He knew she didn’t.) She didn’t last long, a few years at most, and when she was gone, so was her granddaughter. He couldn’t remember ever mourning for anyone, but he mourned for her. 

Years passed. Centuries, even, if he were to bother to count, but alas, even that was uncertain. Everyday was the same. Watch the sun rise, listen to the locals, gossip about others (It was fun, despite the fact that they couldn’t hear him, rendering the task meaningless.), watch the sun set, observe the nocturnal life, repeat.

One day, though, a small child had come to visit. He had worn light armor and an expressionless face; it was quite unfit for a small child his age. What set this child apart, though, was that fact that he stared at him, his cage more specifically, and just silently sat beside it.

The child was occasionally called (That’s how he learned his name was Link. The two may have shared a name then, but not now. The name was as good as a stranger to him now.), but he always returned. He never spoke though.

The kid was there for a couple days. Seriously, no one had spent so much time around him.

He liked the company. Link was different. Why - he wasn't too sure just yet.

“I know you’re there.”

The voice was so soft and rough, he admittedly searched for an older hylian, perhaps searching for this Link.

“Can you hear me?”

The child turned to him and - oh, this poor child! He was speaking to him! His voice didn’t match at all and…

Wait…

Never had he wanted to reach out so badly.

_Yes! Yes, I’m here! I can hear you! I’m Listening!_

No one could hear him. Not even this child, who somehow sensed his presence.

_I’m here!_

It was useless.

_I’m here!_

But he tried all the same.

“I can’t hear you, but that’s okay. I can tell you’re trying.”

It was better than nothing. He would be crying if he could.

“Today is my last day. I’m being declared the personal knight of the princess in two days.”

This child is!? No, no he’s too young!

“I can’t say I’m scared. They’ll just force even worse training on me.”

Oh sweet Malanya. They’ve broken him already.

“When I come back, **if** I come back, will you still be here?”

He couldn’t say anything, but perhaps, since Link can sense him, he didn’t need to. Perhaps, he just needed his presence to be known. 

So he reached out. He pressed against the glass and the stone, against his cage. He tried to bleed his warmth through the barrier, to inject his presence to the outside world.

And he made a promise that he’ll remain. 

Whatever he did, he couldn’t tell, or even see for that matter, but heads turned and he was suddenly hit with more pairs of eyes than he could remember.

The only time that could compare was when he was driven out of his hometown so long ago by his friends, his family, his _supposed Goddess._

An armored hylian grabbed Link, dragging him away from the “dangerous structure.”

Life, if he could call his one, was quieter after that. Less hylians hung out around him. More gave wary, sideline glances, as if his cage were a dormant bomb that would start ticking at any moment. 

He felt sad and hurt, but knew not why that was. He didn’t particularly care about the loneliness. Perhaps it was boredom?

Link didn’t visit until a year later. Yes, he actually counted this time.

He had hardly grown. The kid wore more armor, at least, so he was more protected. His face had a neutral expression, even more so than the last time he saw him. He shadowed a girl, the princess he guessed. She sat herself under a nearby tree, close enough that he could hear her speech.

“I don’t understand! This place is safe, it’s secluded, and there’s witnesses everywhere! Can’t you just ignore my father’s orders and leave me alone!”

She received silence from Link.

“I won’t tell on you. You won’t even get in trouble. So just leave me be, will you? I can handle myself!”

Link sighs, then turns around. The slight raise of his eyebrows are the only indicator of emotion. He watches the kid walk over, changing his location to sit by his cage. He rubs some of the carvings in the stone, though he still keeps an eye on the princess.

Speaking of the princess, she has suddenly forgotten her previous quarrel in favor of examining his cage.

“Amazing! It looks to be some sort of seal. These symbols… Do you think… Oh! This may be the Mirror of Twilight!”

The Mirror of Twilight? Is that what his cage is?

“No, no, that’s not right… I haven't heard of the mirror having a chain like this… And there’s no way to tell if this is real or just a replica…

That’s right. It must be a replica. The real one shattered.”

So not really? It’s a replica?

His thoughts halted.

He shouldn’t be believing anything of what this princess is saying anyways. People tend to babble on and on, and the truth is lost somewhere down the line. It’s how legends came to be. He would know. He watched them form. 

He realizes Link hasn’t said a word when the princess pouts.

“Silent as ever I see.”

Link does a few fancy movements with his hand, which gets a reaction out of the princess.

“Friends…? You’re - No, I shouldn’t be surprised you’re friends with an ancient relic.”

She understood? That was communication?

He’d be lying if he said he noticed the bitter implications of her words, that he wasn’t distracted by the fact she understood Link at all.

The princess laughs to herself, a sad, pained laugh.

“Well, I’m going to look around. Please, just ignore my father’s orders.”

She turned to leave. Link rose, determined to follow her, he supposes.

_I’ll see you later, I hope…_

The kid turned and gave him the faintest of a smile. It was quickly erased, though, and he marched on.

It was as if he heard him.

Link reappeared a few months later. A tall, tanned woman, a smaller, fish like woman, a large and rough man, and a bird-like man accompanied him and the princess this time around. 

He was quick to sit by him this time.

“Right… Everyone, this is Link’s… friend.”

He was glad to see the kid making friends. At least, they were friends… right? They certainly talked like friends. 

_Nice to meet you all._

“It’s just a stone circle… You hylians baffle me.”

“Whaddya like about it, lil buddy?”

”I’m sure Her Highness is just messing with us.”

He watched the kid slowly shrink on himself.

_Hey! I’m real, you know!_

“Oh, no, I assure you. He told me himself a few months ago.”

“Perhaps he senses something we can’t.”

“Yeah, right!” The bird-like man started laughing.

The kid tried to hide his face behind something that he didn’t actually have. A hood, maybe?

This wasn’t okay. They were supposed to be his friends! He even has the title of _personal_ royal guard!

Now he’s mad.

_Stop That!_

He hadn’t registered the ground rising, the group’s figures getting bigger, or even Link vanishing from his sight.

Not until a growl ripped from his throat and he was met with eyes and silence.

They could hear him?

“A… A wolf...?”

They could see him!?

“Get back, Your Highness!”

“That’s a big one! I’ve never seen one that big before.”

“Oi! Link! Snap out of it!”

He was a wolf? He doesn’t remember being a wolf.

New senses flooded his brain, specifically touch and smell.

He could feel shackles on all four legs, feel the sand under his paws, feel the breeze through his fur.

And he could smell. He could smell the salt of the ocean, the fish from the bags of the group, and the trace of earth from Link below him.

He was still trapped by the shackles, but he was free of his cage.

Back to the current situation, he needed to assert himself and stand up for the kid.

He was a wolf now. How? He didn’t know, but needed to work around it nonetheless.

So he sat directly on Link and raised his head up high.

Assert dominance. Claim territory. Protect the only one who knew the truth of the relic.

The fish-like lady spoke for the first time in the form of a laugh. She gently approached and kneeled.

“Hello there. What is your name?”

He didn’t know. His old one he didn’t particularly care for, and she wouldn’t understand him anyway, being a wolf and all. He could keep silent, but he also needed her to know he understood her words, that he’s not your average animal, so he gave a meaningless bark.

She smiled.

“Perhaps Link can translate for you.”

The kid had hesitated, he could tell by the rising heartbeat, though he soon raised one hand to pet him on the neck and wriggled the other out from under him to perform more fancy symbols.

“Nice to meet you, Wolfie,” the lady replied.

He liked this lady, compared to the others, and so he tolerated her giving him a few headpats. 

He may have been touchstarved after an unknown amount of time in his cage, but he’s not going to let just anyone touch him. Not after _that_ introduction. 

But… Wolfie, huh?

His own name.

He’ll take it. That and this Hylian cub too. 

Might as well embrace the wolf.

Link - **his cub** \- had visited a lot more frequently after that. Practically every other day, in fact. He would always lay near Link, acting as a silent guardian to the kid, as the group planned their battle against some foe identified as Calamity Ganon.

After years, centuries perhaps (again, he didn’t bother to count), of being caged, he had learned the language here through chatter and the passing of what he could see of notes and books. So he was more than delighted to learn that the tall woman, Urbosa, started to bring books for him after noticing his ability to read.

Through those books he found the language known as Hylian Sign, as well as the past reincarnations of the hero’s spirit. Their journeys were being used as references and knowledge. Apparently this Ganon guy had been around for a long time. (How he kept returning, though, was baffling, much like the hero’s spirit. Something about that damn Goddess again.)

Yeah, he’s definitely taking the cub now. Nobody else but him seems to care that children are taking charge of a war that not even a hero can stop for good.

The group learned that he was not the Hero of Twilight. The markings (which was another thing to add on to his strange new appearance), the mirror - his cage - and a connection to wolves (that should be self-explanatory) led them to believe as such, but he made sure to shatter that misunderstanding as early as possible. 

He was not a hero. 

He never will be.

He is Wolfie, not Link, the Hero of Twilight, or whatever else it happened to be.

They also learned that he couldn’t leave the beach. His shackles chained him to the mirror. The fact he could leave it at all, they determined, was a miracle itself. So along with books, Zelda brought maps.

She was a lot nicer after he was revealed to not just be some inanimate stone relic. The group as a whole was; to him and to each other.

His cub promised him they’d travel the world after they won and managed to free him.

That was their final visit.

A week later and the sky went red. It rained poison and ash, the precipitation just as crimson as the sea of blood it fell from. The orange pedestals, for the first time, changed to glow an eerie red. Giant mechanical enemies, those that resembled spiders, ravaged the land and tore it apart in an emotionless, merciless extermination. Guardians, he realized; the very weapons they relied on to protect them.

Why were they attacking?

He took notice of the red. Ganon, then, must be the one behind their betrayal.

He was no exception to the destruction. Shocking, considering his existence was only known to more than one person for only a month or so, but at the same time it was to be expected. Their foe had danced around death to fight the hero’s reincarnate, one of which was his cub, without fail for millennia. Who’s to say he can’t also sense a magic seal?

Three lasers, all working in tandem, was what it took to shatter his cage. He fell, the world blurry and drowned under the deafening sound of fractured and broken metal.

There were no shackles.

_There were no shackles!_

He can help! He can fight! It might be difficult as a wolf, but he can claw and bite and distract.

Which way did they say Hyrule Castle was again?

He needed to lose these robots, which shouldn’t be a problem on four legs.

But it was. 

Because at that moment, he realized he only had two.

Which was great! He could properly utilize a weapon and give actual support! But he was slower and his senses were duller.

He couldn’t believe what he was thinking, but he sincerely wished he were a wolf again.

Twisting around the rock and the trees, it was hard to shake them off. But he managed.

It didn’t matter what he ran through. Monster camps? Meh. More of those guardians? He can avoid them. Villages in desolation? Cruel, yes, but he hardly spared them a glance. 

The longer it took, the more worried he grew.

It’s been more than a few hours, surely. Where are those lasers from the beasts? Weren’t the mystic… holy… divine? beasts supposed to be active by now?

He needed to be faster.

Why was he hylian, of all times, now?

Why couldn’t he be a wolf?

He needs to be faster!

He needs to be a wolf!

**پرېږدئ چې لیوه کنټرول ټینګ کړي!**

The world spun for a moment, a kaleidoscope of a scenery piecing itself back together just as quickly as it broke.

He lost balance, and his… his snout? Dug into the earth.

He’s… He’s a wolf!

Keep going. 

**ځه**

He doesn’t know how long it took him - he needed to focus on _staying_ a wolf - but he reached the field…

…

…only to see his cub lifeless in the princess’s arms. Two white-haired hylians watched in silence.

He tried to keep his anger down. Assess the situation. Dispatch vengeance swiftly and effectively.

It was hard.

He never felt this way. Not even with that old lady. (He knew, logically, her situation couldn’t compare here, but the grief, the grief could.)

His cub was dead. There was no way he survived with the bloodloss and the burns, not to mention his entire left side gone and that **hole** in his **head**.

The princess might have seen him, but only one of the white-haired hylians acknowledged him.

The stench of burnt flesh hit his senses with glaring force at the sight.

Link’s murderer was still active.

All was silent, all but the guardian’s beeping, as he felt something crack.

He lost control of the wolf (Or did it give him control?), picked up a fallen guardian blade (how it got there, he didn’t care), and launched at the guardian in silent fury. He dug the blade at an angle through the eye, pushing it past the hilt through the machine’s body. 

It exploded into parts.

But it wasn’t enough.

I t w a s n ‘ t e n o u g h .

Using the sword he looted, whose blade was snapped right off the hilt and in pieces among the mangled corpse, he ground the scattered scraps to dust in static, unbridled **rage**.

Piece - 

after piece - 

after piece.

The only thing to catch his attention, to notice what was going on (admittedly while still pounding the fragment he was working on), was when someone mentioned a Shrine of Resurrection.

Link can be resurrected in the shrine, Princess, he can be saved! Oh, but Princess, it’s quite far and we need to hurry before his soul irreversibly converts to energy and leaves! Please, Princess! Leave him to us!

So Link can be revived?

Link can come back? He can live?

If he wasn’t before, he was listening now.

“You recognize him?”

“Yes. That’s Wolfie, Link’s friend. I don’t know how, but he was able to leave the beach, it seems. He’s… hylian.”

He registered footsteps.

“Wolfie… is it? Can… can you defend Princess Zelda? While we get Link to the shrine?”

He growled, unable to properly form words. He ran for who knows how long (Actually, how isn’t he tired? How isn’t he not even a little winded? NO, that’s not important right now.) to help, saw his cub mutilated and _dead_ , and she wants him to prioritize the princess over him?

**Not** happening.

“Ah! Okay, okay, you protect Link while I’ll stay behind and protect Princess Zelda if - until - she unlocks her powers, yeah?”

He straightens up, lifelessly drops the battered hilt, and nods, searching for another weapon.

He finds one and wordlessly follows the woman carrying his cub to the shrine atop a plateau, ruthlessly shredding any guardian that dares attempt at firing its laser.

The woman listed the possible side effects through breaths (again, how isn’t he fatigued?), mentioning things like memory loss, mental regression, and dysfunctional senses. Link won’t be affected by all of the possibilities, she rambled, but some have a higher chance of occurring than others.

He could care less. As long as Link didn’t end up a completely different person.

He just wanted his cub back.

~~~~~

Lura enjoyed traveling, but her favorite spot was the great plateau. Barely anyone visited there. She was alone and she could climb to her heart’s content without anyone annoying her.

‘It’s too dangerous,’ they say.

‘You should care more about your life,’ they say.

She’s being safe! And jokes on them, she gets to see the amazing wonders the world has to offer! They can all stick to the boring paths all they want, just leave her to live her own life.

Oh, and there’s another reason why Lura likes this place so much.

At the top, there are cool ruins, an awesome view, and barely any monsters!

As well as a magical entity, coined the Keeper.

He rarely speaks to anyone and hangs around a large stone structure as if guarding it. There’s also this massive wolf that occasionally lays by the entrance (that’s always sealed and no one knows why), but the two are never seen together.

No one knows his name, where he came from, his motivations, or how long he’s been guarding that structure.

There is so little known that he and the wolf may as well be one in the same! However ridiculous it sounds, Lura finds herself slowly convinced.

For example, the only times he ever speaks is when someone wanders near the structure, in which case he is said to growl a warning. _Growl!_ Like a wolf! She had to try it herself, and she’s gotta say, the rumors are not unfounded.

And if the rumors are true, then she’s not gonna push her luck, no matter how much she longs to see what’s in the structure.

You only ever get one warning. One explorer learned that the hard way when he tried to push past the Keeper and unlock the seal.

Needless to say, the details were gruesome. 

He didn’t die, she heard, but the trauma was bad enough that he returned home and never went exploring again.

So imagine her surprise when she finds no sign of the Keeper. None.

The wolf isn’t in sight either, which only further concerned Lura.

Perhaps she stumbled on a rare time. The guy’s gotta eat at some point… right?

She was about to turn back, leave the matter alone and not risk being lunged at, when she actually noticed.

The seal was gone.

**Author's Note:**

> Yeah, Wolfie would rather not remember the Calamity. 
> 
> We’ve got an idea for an upcoming installment. It’s cool, “stumbled” across it one day, but it involves music.
> 
> How y’all feel about song fics?
> 
> We find them _more_ than a bit cringy but… **aaaaahhhhhhh -**
> 
> But those _lyrics!_ And _Kass!_
> 
> We just need to avoid the cringe however possible.


End file.
